TALLAHASSEE, Fla. –
The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida today spoke out against Florida
Senate Bill 2692, following a news conference held by TV personality Ben Stein.
The following can be attributed to Howard Simon, Executive Director of the ACLU
of Florida:

“The presumption of this
bill is that all you have to do to teach something in a science class is to call
it science. Simply saying something is science does not make it so and calling
Intelligent Design science, does not make is science. Intelligent Design relies
on the assertion that there is a supernatural creator, which inherently
precludes it from being scientific, as the ACLU proved in our landmark case in
Dover, PA.

“The issue is not whether
theories such as Intelligent Design can be taught in our public schools, but in
what setting. Controversies about theories that rely on a supernatural
explanation may be suitable in a political science or literature class, but to
be included in a science class it must be a theory that is scientifically
verifiable. Allowing schools to masquerade Intelligent Design as science would
be a blunder and an embarrassment for the Florida Legislature. The courts have
spoken on this issue and the message was clear: Intelligent Design, because it
relies on a supernatural power, is a religious view not a scientific view.”